Finding stuff to make large profits on at garage sales used to be simple.
Now, there are many people yard sale flipping. Plus, the people holding the garage sales are now more aware of the value of many collectible items than they used to be, so items are priced higher.
Still, you can find a lot of great items to sell at sales, often for very cheap prices. Often, you can find $10-20 items for under a dollar.
Here are a number of yard sale flipping tips (Excerpts from #1 bestseller Almost Free Money:
- Do your homework ahead of time. Go through the newspaper classifieds and Craig’s List to find sales that advertise what you like to sell, or similar items. Write down when the sales start and end, and what they are supposed to have at the sale that you are interested in. Look for sales that advertise large bunches of stuff, ’25 years of accumulation’, or that type of language in the ad. Make every effort to be at the most attractive sale first when it opens. If you can go to sales on Thursdays and Fridays, you can find much more material to sell than if you wait until the sale has been running for a day or two on Saturday morning. Make yourself a route that hits all of the good sales. This prevents you from wasting time and gas money by going back and forth across the county to get to all of the garage sales. If you can hit a neighborhood or city wide sale, by all means, go there.
- Don’t waste time fiddle-farting around at sales. Treat your garage sailing as a business. It is fun to find stuff at sales, but you are there for a reason. Say hello to the homeowner and be polite, but don’t talk for half an hour. If you get to the tables, and there is obviously only junk there, leave immediately and move onto the next one.
- Look at EVERYTHING at the sale. This may seem to contradict rule number two at first glance,but it really does not. When you get more experienced hitting sales, you will understand exactly what I mean. Don’t waste time gabbing, and wandering around, but make sure you look at all the tables at the sale. I have found tons of great items underneath junk on tables, inside other boxes, scattered in among books, in boxes of toys, and everywhere else you can think of. The items you are looking for are items that the seller does NOT know the value of. This stuff could be anywhere at the sale. As a savvy re-seller,you also have the advantage of having an Amazon selling account. This puts you ahead of 95% of other sellers that you are competing with at garage sales, who are only selling on eBay. Look for media items that you can sell for at higher prices on Amazon, as well as boxed items with bar codes that you can resell. Make sure you quickly grab anything sealed in shrink wrap that you can sell as New.
- This may be the most important rule. Make sure that you can sell the items that you are picking up. Condition of the item is one of the most important things to consider when deciding on whether to buy an item. Is the item operational? Does it have all the parts? Does it need additional cords to be usable? Plug electronic items in to test them. Almost everybody has outdoor outlets available to test with. If they refuse to let you test an item, don’t buy it. It probably does not work. Also, keep in mind that some items are valuable without being functional. You just have to remember that you are going to have to spend additional money for parts, plus spend time fixing the item, which cuts into your profit. Make sure that you examine the entire item. Does it have broken corners,re-glued pieces, etc.?If it does, the collectible value is going to be significantly reduced.
- Keep in mind the shipping cost of heavy items. There are many collectible items that would make nice profits,if it were not for the weight of the item. Figure on all items over one pound to cost over $5 in shipping costs, plus an extra $2+ for every pound after that. A heavy metal item could easily cost your potential winning bidder an additional $15 in shipping fees on top of their winning bid. Consider the total cost that you think the average collector would pay for an item.
Summary
Article Name
The Top 5 Yard Sale Flipping Tips
Description
The best yard sale flipping tips - a Top 5 countdown list of the best tips from a #1 bestselling author and 15 year eBay and Amazon seller of used items
Author
Eric Michael
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